Demon Dynasty

Big trouble? And what could we possibly be risking this season if either or both players missed a few weeks? Half the side could start wacking their opponents every week in the next few rounds and it would have little if any impact on 2014. Might make a few feel better though

I think he's valuable from an effort and 2nd effort point of view Jaded... but im not convinced he does 'alot' of great things. One of many NQR players on the MFC list. At best a decoy to a better forward as he was at the Pies. Unfortunately our better forward departed with depression and the new kid on the block hasn't put foot to leather in the red and blue yet.

Provided he isn't delivered to us as another NQR (inherent but well disguised career debilitating/ending injury ) this is exactly the player we need down back to assist and educate the like of TMc, Garland,Jetta and Watts (assuming he eventually ends up playing most of his footy there...if he makes it). Allows us to move Howe up forward and would also deliver the ball with more accuracy to Hogan/Howe/JKH/Other? Most importantly he can break lines, switch more quickly/accurately by foot and occasionaly drifts forward for the odd mark and goal. Allows us to move Howe up forward and would also deliver the ball with more accuracy to Hogan/Howe etc. I would take him in a heart beat and trade Grimes/Terlich/Frawley out for him and one other classy/pacey half back who can hit a target and break lines. Although we might have one of our own in the making atm in Jetta (and possibly Kent down the track) so the 2nd might not be totally crucial but i'd still like to see it. Especially if we keep losing more of the center clearance work than we win in the next season or 2 as most of our forward 50 entries will need to come off rebounds from HB if we are to win more than a handfull of matches.

Like many downtrodden MFC supporters.... too easily pleased with 2nd best.Should've beaten the Saints.... should've beaten the Dogs (twice), should've beaten Gold Coast, should've won today etc etc. I think what we are seeing is this list performing about or close to its potential albeit with some upside still to come with some of the younger boys like Jetta, JKH, Tyson, Vince and possibly a few others. Hopefully we recruit well in the pre season and don't let the careers of these young men go to waste by continuing to give games to some of the very average talent around them.

We've won 4 matches out of 17. Thats 13 losses. Its still pathetic. No matter which way you try and dress it up we still suck. Not saying it isn't an improvement either but its many miles away from being AFL standard.The fact that we struggled to stay in touch with a badly out of form opponent in the first half tells the tale of where this club is at atm. Don't kid yourself...without another injection of serious talent at year's end, this club is going nowhere fast. Roosy is well aware of this... hence why he's taking a look at every possibility from here...both from a "retention" and a "moving on" list management point of view. The axe will fall and fall harshly for some once the season ends for us in 5 weeks. Many of these blokes are playing for their AFL carreer right now.

I think we all know the answer to that

Everyone's forgetting who we played. Port were in terrible form coming into this match having lost 3 of their last 3 matches (2 of them at Adelaide oval) to IMO 2 very poor teams in Adelaide and the Tiges...and an in form Essendrug. We have beaten all of those teams this year. This should have been a decent win for us.... yet we still managed to allow a terribly out of form team to find their mojo a little and kick 6 unanswered goals in the first half. The game was won and lost right there. Honorable comeback my ass. Any other half decent team would have won that by 3 to 4 goals and the better clubs in a canter.

Guys Grimes is never going to learn how to kick or more importantly...Not to kick it so near the frickin boundary line so often. Its part of the way he rolls. Like many others in this list who are flawed/NQR footballers, they need to be traded/delisted at years end if we are ever going to turn this [censored] around. Same old week after week... year after year...for 7 years now. We scrap and fight a little in the first 5 or 15 minutes... only to see a harder running, faster, more clever team blow out a lead in the last 10 minutes of 1st quarter to see us behind by a good margin at quarter time. This lead is either extended or maintained in the 2nd. 3rd quarter we come out and either match the opponent on the scoreboard or catch up a little to appear as if we've made a decent fist of the game.... usually after the game is either lost or almost put to bed in the 1st half. If we get a sniff or a run on we get our noses in front now and then...only to be killed by our own poor execution around the ground or in front of goal allowing the opposition to sneak in a few quick ones against the run of play for the win. When, if ever, do we bust open a game from behind or even when in front.... and go on to cruise to a decent 4 to 6 win!!?????? As we are all too familiar, we rarely ever win matches and we mostly try to win them coming from behind. This is no way to play a "Winning Brand" of AFL football and is never going to get us very far at all. Port were in terrible form yet we still allowed them to kick 6 unanswered goals in the 1st half with some players racking up only 2 or 3 disposals for a whole half of footy. 15 to 20 minutes of playing ok footy in a first half is rarely going to win you a match at this level. As always, we leave too much to too few and we push the accelerator too late after the horse has bolted... crap footy all round... not going anywhere until we get some class some run and some decent kicking skills into this team.

Grimes (and Dawes??) .....hopeless. I would dump Grimes at year's end. I've heard and seen enough. Just not up to it at this level and way too many "CLUTCH" turnovers at crucial times in a match.

Yet for our opponents, whenever we get close, the ump seems to find a beautiful free to them just to keep them in touch or get them in front

Has anyone noticed when we kick goals the ump is rarely involved. I'm talking most matches.....not just this one

Yep....Watts across half back to clean up the disposals "FORWARD" of play as first option which he is good at. Get the pill moving forward as quickly as possible to put the opposition under pressure and create opportunities with run and carry. Howe up forward to take the odd specky and kick a goal or two

This is a given when playing any interstate team and has been for years. The umps tend to always ensure the home team has at least a 3 to 4 goal lead going into the break.....then ease off a little in the 2nd half to make things look more respectable.

The player tackling should never be awarded a free kick once he loses his feet and goes to ground beside or on top of the guy who got the ball first. The tackler MUST keep his feet to be awarded holding the ball IMO. Once the 3rd man enters the contest it should be automatic ball up....never holding the ball.

I don't have fox but for me it sounds like we are falling down again up forward both in contested marking capability and once the ball hits the deck. They seem to get it way too often without anough pressure or any crumbers on our part

Thats because you have seen their last quarter performance......wait for it !! Anything to get Port over the line

His mental well being may not be so well after playing a match with this current line up in its present form... Dawesy included. Although saying that, i'm forgetting the quality of the delivery inside 50... amazing stuff indeed. I have pity on any forward trying to perform with our disorganised and horribly skilled mids and half backs atm. I watched one passage over the weekend, i think it might have been out on the full or a free kick forward of the wing to us, kicking to the city end on the northern side. An ideal set up i50 opened up straight after the free with most opposition players running forward of the ball not expecting the turnover. With an open forward line of only Dawesy and Howe (and maybe one other who i can't recall) in open space. Yet as usual, instead of moving/kicking the ball quickly to a one on one Dawes on the lead or maybe deep to Howe for the overhead speckie (both of whom would have had a good chance of out marking their opponent), our player sat behind the mark for what seemed like forever as our mids proceeded to run straight towards the goals (no not out wide or away from the hot zone) and inside 50, filling much of the open spaces, and dragging their direct opponents with them into the same areas....space/time and opportunity lost. By the time we took our kick it was all over red rover and nothing came of our entry. In fact i could be wrong as i was so discusted with this piece of play i have a funny feeling the ball was rebounded out of our forward 50 into the Cats 50 for an easy goal on the rebound! Examples like the above happen far too often to be an accident IMO and we presently don't have one weapon that i can think of (both as a team and individually...ie., speed across the ground, quick accurate ball movement through a press by foot, amazing contested marks up forward, busy skilled crumbers up forward that can kick snap goals, a clearance winning mid field, an amazing outside skillful running team that can deliver accurately by foot or kick long goals from around 50, a tackling machine that will wear the opponent down over say 3 quarters and work their ass off to kick a winning score, a dangerous multi pronged goal kicking forward line etc etc) that will worry the opposition or force them to play accountable footy where they are unable to continually play off and forward/lateral of their opponent (ie., us) on the spread as soon as they get any sniff that they're about to win a contested ball. There is just nothing inspiring at all in this present line up that i can see that will see us become anything other than what we are right now....absolutely horrid. Sure, we might see marginal improvements from certain individuals as the years go by but nothing that will make a big enough difference to see us playing finals footy on a regular basis. The club just needs to keep recruiting and turning over many players each year (at least a dozen or more if possible this year) until we finally fill up the gaping holes, which are unfortunately, all over the park .... with a few exceptions. Even then i just can't see us attracting the sort of caliber player we would need to in order to turn this around. Especially given the AFL's expansion agenda which is sucking the talent away from the poorer Vic clubs like us (yep i include Skully in this....he would be a reasonably handy fill in for Cross right about now and def a better option than Bail/Nicho/Tappy/M Jones long term). Subject to some sort of amazing miracle recruiting coup in the next 2 to 3 years, If Roosy can't turn this around by then (assuming he's still about) ....we are all but buggered.

Nutbean the game was well and truly over at half time. Pretty much any half decent team knows that they will always outscore us relatively easy in the first half of a match if they put their foot down early on and go really hard at our obsessive lateral/backwards possession game in defence and across the middle of the ground when we do occasionally hit targets there. They know we are so poor at finding our way up the ground by foot, with so many clanger turnovers, that once ahead by a decent margin early (say 5 to 6 goals or so) they probably relax a touch in the second half knowing we are a non-threat and at any stage they can turn up the wick again if we do happen to get it under 4 goals or so. That's how easy we are to beat atm. The thing is we might be ok at defending in our back half and to a lessor degree through the middle when we have our "ideal" player set-up and structure (ie., very few key players out injured, like Cross, and most in very good form like Vince, Jones and Tyson). Some of these guys able to push back and help out in defence to rebound (Vince and Tyson were very good at this earlier in the year).However, most teams know they will also win the majority of center clearances against us fairly easily. I don't believe even the best defence in the league would handle the amount of ball that comes into our defensive 50 week after week. The bulk of the game is played in "our defensive half". There's very little overlap style gut running and quick 'play on' from our guys compared to most clubs as they seem unable or unwilling to play forward of their opponent, possibly because they don't have much faith that the next player will more than likely beat his opponent or that the guy who has the ball is likely to get accurate disposals to them for the receive...who knows? So we also don't stretch or tire out our opponents as much as other clubs by making them chase us up the field. We continually play a stop start very slow ball movement style game, giving the opponent a nice easy jog to their next set up/wall up the field or on the mark while we take forever. As you know we often just can't hit a target anyway, resulting in a turnover in the worst places on the ground and easy goals from turnovers again and again. In short we might be fairly good at defending given the number of times the ball comes into our defensive 50, but we are also very easily defended against at the wrong end of the ground (for us), namely through the middle where the walls are built and even down back with weight of numbers as our backs get worn down with the continual entries. We will lkeep getting smashed by anyone outside of the bottom 6 until we can find.... 1. Some new on ball tallent who (collectively with say Jones, Cross, Tyson, Vince) can win more clearances than our opposition on a regular basis (Edit: in future years this should include Viney of course) 2. One or two pacey/agile outside runners who can spread and deliver the ball lace out on a regular basis coming i50 (eg Burgoyne/Pendels types) 3. At least two pacey running players off HB who can also use the ball and hit targets on a dime (eg Shaw/Malceski types) 4. A decent lead up forward who can receive the good work from up the field and kick clutch goals (Buddy/Hawkins types... Hogan maybe ? ). 5. A decent alternative overhead mark as an alternative to the lead up forward so we can go deep if the lead is shut down (Roughhead/Cloke types) 6. A very quick, agile, classy crumber who knows where to get to to take advantage of the spills off the deep forward entries to the overhead target (Cyril/Milne types...JKH maybe?) Can i see us finding the above anytime soon (ie., within the next 5 to 10 years) given the way the AFL has sucked the lessor clubs dry with the new start ups (priority picks etc), the AFL rigged fixture, our pitiful performances in the last decade etc? Well, failing a minor Roos driven miracle, that would be a big fat nope i'm afraid.

Really guys? I seriously hope i don't see him at all this year and they wrap him in cotton wool, getting him back to 110% fitness between now and pre season. With our luck, if he does play his first game later this year, he'd likely go down in a screaming heap with some freak of an accident like a broken ankle, something only the MFC seems to be able to pull from the mire with anyone looking like they might be a potential superstar. A full pre season to gain some extra strength, fitness and confidence in his bod and offer some hope to the others who might be left to play with him next year if he makes it. A full clean out of most of the present list at year's end... ie., pretty much a new "Roos" derived list for 2015 to begin the new rebuild of a rebuild of a rebuild (and yes i realise this would take more than one pre season, but hey, at this point Roos wont be there to coach in the 3rd year....ughh)......and....you never know....we might finally see a new side playing consistent AFL standard footy. Who knows, we might then start kicking a half decent score that might worry the opposition a few more times than the 4 we've seen so far. Regardless, i would be extremely surprised (and dissapointed) if Roos made such a dumb decision as to play him for one or 2 matches later this year given where Hulk is coming from injury wise and the present state (losing mentality) of this group. If he does, it would be for purely selfish reasons and not in the short or long term interests of Hogan IMO.

You mean he's coming back before the season's out to be on the receiving end of our magnificent forward 50 entry work!!??

I agree with you on the 10 or more.... but only on the more part. The list is so devoid of decent AFL talent it will take a monumental clean out over the next 2 pre season drafts to even make us competitive with teams up to about 8th or so on the ladder. Anything less will simply see us playing "marginally" more competitive footy for maybe 6 to 8 wins at best but never making the finals. The time has come to move most of this list on. We've pretty much ran through the entire list so far this season and with a few exceptions like JKH/Kent/Salem showing glimmers of hope and Tyson/Viney/Vince starring early and in patches, we've seen very little from anyone else other than the half dozen seniors who turn up most weeks.

Thats about 50 minutes more than I watched or listened to. We are just too predictably average and ordinary against anyone outside the bottom 6 and have been for 7 years now... Tigers and Bombers the only exceptions for some reason.

He's a paid up apologist/spruiker for the AFL/Umpiring fraternity. So bland and predictable, I dont actually hear or take in anything he says anymore. Was a good leader and solid player on field but as a special comments guy he completely sucks

The time for excuses is surely over. We've been dishing up nonsense excuses like this getting close to almost a decade now. Other teams travel every other week and still find a way to win a decent share of games both at home and consecutive "away" games. The basic factor here is what Old Dee reminds us every other week.... the majority on the list is just not AFL capable. Most are VFL standard at best.

I would normally agree with you and ive been a Roos stalwart from day one...but no matter what level you coach...no matter the team sport .... the worst thing you can tell any player is "you cant play" which is effectively what he said in the presser. You might think that... you might give a spray to relevant player/s and/or constructive criticism, but you never actually come out and say that to them.Massive confidence sapper and thats exactly what we're seeing. A team completely devoid of any confidence with a few usual die hards giving their all as its in their blood to not lie down (eg Viney)